Safe Places
by ducky72
Summary: Jenny discovers a secret. Sequel to "I Don't Regret a Thing".
1. My Hands are Tied

**Summery:** It all started at a stormy night and you can read about it in the first part of this "No-Regret"-series: "I Don´t Regret a Thing".

This new part of my "No-Regret"-series takes place between "I Don't Regret a Thing" and "Deja-Vu" and deals with how Jenny had found out about Abby's and Gibbs's relationship.

**Rating:** T

**Disclaimer:** I don´t own the characters. But I once more needed to borrow them for this sequel.

**Spoilers:** None as far as the show is concerned.

**Beta:** Pretty Dead Flower - thank you so much for your great advice!

**Timeline:** While reading this, please keep in mind that **"Safe Places"** takes place 4-5 months after **"I Don't Regret a Thing"** and about four months before **"Deja-Vu"**. This story gives an explanation to what we learn at the end of "Déjà-Vu": Jenny had by chance found out about Abby and Gibbs being in a serious relationship and she had promised to not tell anyone about the two of them.

_**-**__**Enjoy-**_

_**Safe Places**_

_**Preface: **_

Abby and Gibbs managed well to not let show that they were together. Having already met in secret before this was called a serious relationship, it wasn´t a real challenge for them now. Thus their relationship went unnoticed.

Almost.

About four months after Gibbs had managed to frighten Tony and McGee away and out of Abby´s apartment -- and with this prevent _them_ from understanding what was going on between Abby and him -- Jenny Shepard, Director of NCIS and former love-interest of Gibbs, had found out at the end of November.

By pure chance.

_**-x**__**xx-**_

**1. My Hands Are Tied**

One day, at the end of November, an infuriated female figure left the elevator on the uppermost floor of NCIS-Headquarters and stormed towards the Director's office. Although being an employee at NCIS, the young woman was a rarely seen visitor to this level.

Down in the squad-room Gibbs had noticed what had happened upstairs and a frown had settled on his forehead. He prepared himself for whatever trouble was going to come up.

Not even five minutes later the phone on Gibbs's desk went off. With a sigh of having his fears confirmed, he picked up the receiver.

"I am going to kill her, Gibbs!" Abby's outraged voice reached his ear, making him increase the distance between the receiver and his ear immediately.

"Abs, calm down...," Gibbs finally brought the speaker to his mouth, but he had to find that the caller had already hung up.

Gibbs sighed. Whatever this was about, he would have make his way to the Director's office to find out. He left his desk and, followed by the stares of his team who definitely must have heard Abby's shouting, he rushed up the stairs.

When Gibbs stormed in, Cynthia opened her mouth to say something, but she was cut short by Gibbs.

"The Director is awaiting me, Cynthia," he said without even looking at Cynthia and he opened the door to Jenny's office to find Jenny and Abby stare daggers at each other. Trying to keep at least some of his self-control, he took a deep breath and slowly closed the door. He resisted the urge to cross the room and get over to Abby.

"What the hell...?" he instead wanted to know in an angry tone.

"Gibbs, tell her I won't continue working in my lab if my instruments are not safe! I won't even set one single foot in my lab again until someone made sure!" Abby sounded pretty pissed.

"Jethro, I'm sorry. My hands are tied," Jenny told Gibbs in a calm voice.

"What a nice metaphor, Gibbs," Abby remarked, biting back a grin.

But Gibbs recognized the faint twitching in the corners of Abby's eyes and he throws her a warning look. Abby swirled around and tramped to the door where Gibbs was blocking her way. They kept staring at each other for a minute in utter tension until Gibbs eventually stepped aside to let Abby pass and walk out the door, slamming it behind her.

Jenny knows, Gibbs thinks highly of his team-members and he would defend them to the bones. And Abby -- Abby has always enjoyed his special protection.

"Jen, would you please be so kind as to let me know what all this is about?" Gibbs eventually wants to know.

"Miss Sciuto has applied for a safety check of her lab equipment including an exchange of all safety working parts. I can't give my okay to that. We need to take the financial shortcut into consideration. ... . I can't admit to this until next year." She handed the sheet of paper she held in her hand to Gibbs, who was impatiently waving his hand since she had picked it up.

Gibbs squinted at the sheet, increasing the distance between the page and his eyes as much as possible until Jenny cleared her throat, making him look up at her to find she was presenting him her glasses.

He took them with an embarrassed look and read.

"This says: Lab equipment has to be checked at least once a year. The check has already been postponed and is now overdue for more than half a year. If safety working parts are not exchanged regularly, the manufacturer does not accept responsibility in case something should happen." Gibbs took a deep breath.

"Jen!" he then exclaimed, his face twisted in shock as he took off her glasses, fighting to keep calm.

"Jethro, I have to respect the financial situation," Jenny lowly told him again.

"Jen, you are Director of this 'company'. Abby is right. If her lab equipment isn't safe, she won't set her feet in her lab again," Gibbs´ voice clearly showed his anger.

"Je...," Jenny tried to interrupt him, but this only added to his anger.

"I'll promise!" With this Gibbs left, slamming the door like Abby had done before.

Being completely at a loss, Jenny shook her head and the next day she once more had to find, Gibbs's manners were not only rubbing off on his agents but now on Abby as well. Abby did not come into work the next morning and Jenny decided to keep quiet and wait if things would get sorted out.

But things did not sort out. Of course not! Abby didn't come into work the next day and the day after that day as well. Jenny phoned her and offered her to see what she could do if Abby came back to work. But Abby stayed to her words and her simple answer was, "No!"

Thus, Jenny instantly ordered Gibbs to her office.

"She cannot do that, Jethro," Jenny started calmly. Inwardly, however, she was tensed and not sure how much it would take for her to let show how upset she really was.

"She can!" Gibbs replied, equally calm. But other than Jenny he was completely composed.

"How am I going to explain this to...?" Jenny knew, this was not going to be easy.

"To whom, Jen? You are the Director."

Jenny felt that Gibbs was turning against her. "But she can't just stay away from work. You know that, but you stand up for her against me nevertheless! What's wrong with you, Jethro?"

"Deduct it from her paid vacation," was Gibbs's honest suggestion and without another word he simply left the office.

Jenny gave up. To discuss things with Jethro and win the discussion had always been her weak spot. Moreover she knew that he was right, and she hated it.

Jenny would have to talk to Abby once again. She was the best lab tech NCIS had and she didn't want to loose her. Maybe they could come to a compromise if she talked to her in private.

Jenny had then without success tried to reach Abby all day long to ask her for a private conversation. So she decided to look in on her after work to talk to her. She drove up to her place, rang the bell a countless times, but Abby seemed to not be at home.

_To be continued…_

_If you want to know what happens next ... don´t hesitate to come back!_


	2. Discovering Their Secret

_**A/N:**__ I´m sorry this chapter took a while. I have been pretty busy and I hope you accept this as an excuse._

_Big thank you to my beta Molly for taking your time in-between studies._

_**-x-**_

**2. Discovering a Secret**

Jenny was upset even more now. With Abby refusing to come into work and not willing to even talk to her, Jenny decided that she needed to talk to someone else to vent her emotions. As Gibbs had only stared daggers at her the last three days, Jenny thought she should probably try to talk to _him_ and a few minutes later Jenny arrived at his house.

The house was brightly lit, which was puzzling to Jenny as the lights in the basement were turned on as well. At this time of the day Jethro was most likely working on the boat in his basement and whenever he was down there, the rest of house was usually lying in darkness.

Still wondering, Jenny grasped the doorknob and pushed the door open. The door wasn't locked. It never was.

Jenny curiously entered the house.

She was almost going to call for him, but what she saw only added to her puzzlement and her astonishment made her stay silent.

There was a white path of flour leading from the kitchen across the parquet floor of the entrance hall to the door frame which led to the basement.

Silently Jenny took a few steps forward till she was able to cast a look into the kitchen. She was pretty much surprised to find the kitchen resembled a battlefield. The kitchen table was loaded with ingredients and everything that's needed for baking. Flour was scattered practically everywhere and in addition to that, an egg was lying on the floor, smashed and gooey.

Jenny could not remember ever having seen Gibbs bake. And why on earth should he do such an unnecessary task of house work? Although, if he chose to try, _this_ was exactly how Jenny would have imagined his kitchen would look like.

Without thinking any further, Jenny decided to have a look at his basement. She most likely would find him there, working off an annoying encounter with flour&Co and sanding his boat.

Still smiling in remembrance of the flour-spotted kitchen and taking care to not step in the path of flour in the entrance hall, Jenny finally rounded the corner to the basement.

The next moment her mouth fell open and after seconds during which she hadn't been able to move, she silently turned and left the house. She breathed in deeply as she walked to her car and by the time she reached there, she was shaking her head in disbelief. A small smile, however, was washing over her face.

What she had just seen had given her heart a stabbing pain. Yet, this had only lasted for a short moment. Now she did understand Jethro´s behaviour a few days ago.

Down in Gibbs's basement Jenny had seen Abby sitting on the workbench, her legs wrapped around Gibbs, who was completely covered in flour. Shirt, pants, socks... Socks? Gibbs had obviously not been working on his boat. His hair probably was dusted with flour, too, but Jenny only could guess.

It's needless to mention that Abby's clothing was flour-spotted as well, but it was obvious that it had been applied there by Jethro´s hands.

Abby had been giggling and Jenny had wondered why she hadn't heard it before. Jethro´s face had been buried in Abby's neck. He had been mumbling something into her neck or possibly her ear, which had made her laugh and he immediately had joined her laughter.

His hands had been busy underneath Abby's shirt.

For a short moment it had hurt Jenny to see Gibbs happy with another woman, in addition to that one she knew quite well. But what she had just witnessed had only confirmed her decision of years ago to not warm up her former relationship with Jethro. They both had moved on. They both had changed too much throughout the years. This scenario in his house nevertheless had utterly surprised Jenny. Never would she have believed Abby to be Jethro´s type.

The laughter, the obviously playful behaviour -- flour scattered all over the house -- Abby and Gibbs seemed to really be happy. On her drive back home, Jenny briefly wondered how long this relationship had been going on unnoticed now. With Jethro, one never knew!

Mulling over her unexpected discovery, Jenny found there was only one thing she could do. She had to order Gibbs to her office the next morning.

_**-x-**_

_To be continued…_

_That's__ how Jenny found out about Abby and Gibbs. Wanna know what happened the next morning? Come back for the next chapter..._

_(__You don´t want to know what had happened in the kitchen and what was going on down in Gibbs´s basement, do you? :-) ) _


	3. Setting Conditions

_A/N:__ Thanks for all your nice reviews. I love them. They keep my mood up to create more stories around this specific Abby/Gibbs relationship like a soon to be started collection of one-shots around Abby´s pregnancy and there even is a drama building somewhere in my brainbox. And if you really want to know what happened in the kitchen -- I was not really planning to reveal this, but how about a separate story called..."When Abby was on strike"?_

_Now, enough blahblah. It´s getting serious at NCIS Headquarters the next morning... Enjoy!_

_**-xxx-**_

**3. Setting Conditions**

The next morning Jenny was standing on the upper floor, overlooking the squad room. She had already noticed some time ago that Gibbs had changed somewhat, which she just couldn't pinpoint on, and Jenny had wondered about the reasons for some time now, even had come up with the idea of a woman being involved, but now that she knew for sure, the relaxed expression on Gibbs's face simply spoke volumes. Everything just made sense now.

"Special Agent Gibbs!" Jenny called out after a while and she waited for Gibbs to look up at her. "My office!" she ordered firmly.

Gibbs narrowed his eyes. There had been a certain tone in Jenny's voice which told him that this was not about the job. Or at least, not completely about the job.

With suspicion Gibbs went up the stairs and followed Jenny to her office, flinging the doors shut behind him. He was not really pissed off, but figured it might be a useful behaviour towards 'Madam Director' if he wanted Abby back at her lab rather soon.

Abby and Gibbs actually didn't feel uneasy about the current situation, but Abby already missed her lab.

"What, Jen?" Gibbs wanted to know in a cold voice when Jenny threw him a warning look concerning the way he used to treat her door. He would not give in, though.

"Special Agent Gibbs," Jenny started thoughtfully. "I wanted to let you know that I might at least agree to a function check of the equipment in Miss Sciuto´s lab if ..."

"If, Jen?" Gibbs squinted. He had a bad feeling that there was something fishy about this conversation.

"Yes 'if'..." Jenny tried to emphasize her confirmation by adding, "Special Agent Gibbs."

"Special Agent Gibbs? Why that formal, Jen?" Gibbs asked suspiciously, but didn't get an answer immediately. He thus wanted to know, "You sure this is all, Jen? I told you Abby won't come back if her equipment isn't safe. You can put it one way or the other, Jen!"

"I wasn't sure you weren't just gambling, Jethro." Jenny wasn't sure if this was the right way to address the subject.

"You _weren't_? That means, you are now?" Gibbs was wondering what Jenny was actually talking about.

"That means, I now know you are not, Jethro."

If that was what Jenny had called him up for, he was just wasting his time listening to this babble.

"See you, Jen." Gibbs walked over to the door and put his hand on the door-handle, but then was stopped by Jenny's words.

"I am able to push her demands through. And I will. On one condition only, Jethro."

"You won't set conditions on her, Jenny," Gibbs once again emphasized, being astonished himself that he succeeded in staying calm for such a long time.

Jenny finally got to the point. "Not on her, Jethro. On you."

Letting go of the door-handle Gibbs stared at Jenny, his face showing utter surprise. He didn't have the slightest clue what this discussion was about. Obviously it had never really been about Abby's lab-equipment. But what on earth was Jenny talking about?

Jenny waited another second before she started talking. "You will attach a lock to your front door, Jethro."

Gibbs's eyes were getting smaller as he listened...

"And you will use it," Jenny demanded seriously.

... And even smaller, while he was waiting for more to come...

"And about the door bell -- you will fix the door bell as well!" Jenny had to admit to herself that she enjoyed the questioning look on Gibbs's face.

"Jen, what the hell are you talking about?"

Gibbs never had bothered to have his house locked and no one had ever complained about that. The door bell was broken indeed, but no one had ever cared to use it when it had worked either. Visitors were free to knock before entering his house or they just could enter and call for him.

"Well," Jenny knew she had to finally tell him. "I don't want to think about what I might have seen last night at your house if I had dropped by only a few minutes later..." Jenny paused for some moments to let Gibbs's mind process what she had just said.

_To be continued..._


	4. Safe Places

"_Well," Jenny knew she had to finally tell him. "I don't want to think about what I might have seen last night at your house if I had dropped by only a few minutes later..." Jenny paused for some moments to let Gibbs's mind process what she had just said. _

_**-x-**_

**4. Safe Places**

Gibbs did not say anything but the expression on his face gave away that he eventually started to realize what Jenny was talking about. He smirked in remembrance of the previous night and he indeed felt a bit awkward on the thought that anyone could have had entered his house anytime and could have witnessed Abby and him making love in his basement.

Jenny leaned forward before she spoke in a rather low voice as if she feared someone was listening, "If you want to keep this a secret, Jethro, and I assume that's what you want it to be, don't give your visitors a chance to find out by bursting into your house at all the wrong moments."

Gibbs really was at a loss for words. He looked embarrassed and angry all at the same moment. Embarrassed, because whatever Jenny had seen, it most likely had reminded her of her relationship with him and angry, because he suddenly became aware of how careless he had been to not think of unexpected visitors, even if this was a rare occurrence.

In addition to that, Gibbs wasn't sure how to interpret the smile that appeared on Jenny's lips.

"My lips are sealed, Jethro," Jenny eventually reassured him. She was eager to learn more about this odd relationship, but she choose to not interfere. Not, except... "How long have you...?" She left the question unfinished.

Knowing exactly what Jenny fervently was wondering about, Gibbs looked at her for a while, recalling the storm two and a half years ago and how it had changed his life.(°)

"You wouldn't believe me," he finally told Jenny, the smile on his face telling her it was not just days or a few weeks.

Gibbs slightly nodded, tilted his head and turned to leave her office. Just before closing the door completely behind him, he opened it a crack again, stuck his head inside and looked at Jenny.

"Thanks, Jen," he said and went back to the squad room.

Jenny leaned back in her office chair, folded her arms and shook her head in disbelief. Gibbs had triumphed once again.

_**-x-**_

Deep in thoughts and visibly restless, Gibbs spent the next hour at his desk. Not only did Tony, McGee and Ziva wonder about his strange change in behaviour, but every few minutes Jenny appeared on the upper floor and peered down to the squad room, her eyes resting on Gibbs for a minute before she went back to her office.

_Jethro, I __can't see you suffer like this any longer_, Jenny thought when finding his nervousness grow each time she went to have a look over the squad room. Jenny eventually made a decision. She went back to her office and not even a minute later, Gibbs's phone rang.

"Special Agent Gibbs, didn't I give you an order to carry out?" Jenny's voice reached his ear.

Gibbs took a deep breath to say something, but Jenny didn't give him a chance to speak.

"I obviously forgot to mention this is a first priority order. I expect you to take this as serious as a murder case, and I'll be checking this evening. Did you get me, Special Agent Gibbs?"

"Yes, Director," Gibbs stumbled, Jenny´s way of insisting on having this done instantly, taking him by utter surprise.

Gibbs had not even put the speaker back on the phone when he stood up, grabbed his jacket and his keys, rounded his table and before leaving told Tony, "You are in charge, DiNozzo!"

The team stared after him, but eventually they all just shrugged. They had long given up trying to understand their boss. Moreover he obviously was following one of the Director's direct instructions.

_**-x-**_

Jenny indeed had checked in the evening.

The house again was brightly lit. She approached the front door, put her hand on the doorknob and pushed. The door was locked. Upon using the door bell, she heard a simple but powerful ring tone.

No one answered the door, though.

With a smile on her lips Jenny turned and was walking back to her car when her cell phone went off. Upon seeing the caller's ID, her smile widened.

"Jethro!?" Jenny's voice held a tone of astonishment.

"Satisfied, Jen?" Gibbs wanted to know.

"Tell Abby she may call the service tomorrow," was Jenny's plain answer.

_**-x-**_

The next day Abby came back into work, called the service and happily resumed her work, starting with taking down the new evidences which were waiting for her and setting up some tests which didn't need the use of electrical lab equipment immediately.

And although everyone was aware that Gibbs's stubbornness had to do a lot with that, no one knew the whole truth. No one even seemed to wonder about the lock and the working door bell at Gibbs's house. The lock, by the way, he only used when Abby was with him. And should anyone ever ask him about the lock, he would have told them that they had had some break-ins in the neighbourhood recently, nothing major but he didn't want someone steeling the new boat he was about to build whilst he was at work….

_**-The End-**_

_(of "Safe Places" __)_

(°)read about that in "I Don´t Regret A Thing"

_A/N: __That´s it for this sequel of "I Don´t Regret A Thing", but not the end of this "No-Regret"-series. I am going to follow the two of them -- soon to be three of them -- for a little while and you are invited to do so as well..._


End file.
